Cheating

For a student that cheats, cheating isn’t a problem, it’s the solution. Even though it is not publicly accepted, many students have indeed decided to take a short cut in the race towards graduation and cheat (Bowers, 1964). But there are those that oppose cheating and consider that to be a problem in itself.

“Cheating is a serious problem in many countries. The cheater is a free rider and therefore gets higher marks than he or she deserves. The efficiency of the country’s educational system is reduced, because cheating distorts competition, diminishes the student’s incentive to study, and leads to inaccurate evaluation of the student’s abilities.” (Magnus et al., 2002)

2.2.1 Definition of cheating

Academic cheating involves fraudulent means to achieve higher grade (Michaels and Mirht, 1989). Rather than being the norm, can cheating within academic institutions be defined as a specific type of deviant behavior (Mixon, 1996). It gives an unfair advantage to the person cheating and distorts the conventional evaluation of learning processes.

But what exactly can be considered as academic cheating? According to MIT’s handbook on academic integrity there are clear indications about how a student should NOT behave when pursuing an academic carrier (Brennecke, 2010):

 Cheating is when a student uses unauthorized material in an exam, copies answers from another student or submits the same paper in more than one class.

 Plagiarism refers to copying someone else’s work and posing it as your own. This happens when a student does not adequately cite sources and references.

 Unauthorized collaboration is when students work together on projects that are supposed to be individual projects.

 Finally, facilitating academic dishonesty refers to when a student assists another student on a project that is supposed to be done individually.

2.2.2 Who cheats and why

The individualistic view looks at demographic variables or inherent individual characteristics such as age, sex, marital status or class when trying to determine tendencies toward cheating (Aiken, 1991, Barnes, 1975, Gardner et al., 1988).

Many studies have focused on the relationship between cheating and individual academic achievement (Bunn et al., 1992, Haines et al., 1986, Singhal, 1982). All indicates that students with lower grades (grade point average or GPA) have a higher propensity to cheat. However, McCabe et al. (1997) suggested that students with high GPA may also have a tendency to cheat depending on the relevance of the course.

Contextually there have been recorded a number of situational factors that influence cheating behavior (Crown and Spiller, 1998). The significance of observing others cheat (Bunn et al., 1992), being in regular contact with someone that cheats (Michaels and Miethe, 1978) or students perception of cheating (Ward and Tittle, 1993) have all been shown to have a significant effect on cheating.

Other social characteristics that have been shown to correlate with cheating include students that belong to some sub culture of the mainstream collage culture like sorority girls, fraternity boys or varsity athletes (Baird, 1980, Haines et al., 1986).

The morale climate within an institution can have profound effect on cheating (Bushway and Nash, 1977). According to their study, a student may be more inclined to cheat if the relationship between morality and cheating is not clear.

Malinowsky and Smith, (1992) found a clear correlation between a student’s morale reasoning and attitude towards cheating. Students with low moral judgment cheat more.

Whereas students with higher moral standards cheat less but will also cheat if the perceived benefits from engaging in cheating increase.

2.2.3 Caught cheating

Apparently there seems to be little correlation between the severity of the punishment if caught cheating and frequency of cheating. The perceived punishment can be minor, like only having to retake the course, or it can be more severe where the student may fail the course or even be expelled from the institution. No matter how severe the punishment is, it will not play a major role when a student engages in cheating because the student does not expect to get caught. The student already knows that he is not supposed to cheat, but does it anyway (Fisher, 1970, Bunn et al., 1992). In extreme cases like in the ancient Chinese civil servant test,

material. If a student was caught cheating, both the student and the person responsible for monitoring the student, were killed. Still people cheated (Brickman, 1961).

2.2.4 Statistics on cheating

Students can start cheating at an early age. Schab (1969) reported 24% of girls and 20% of boys cheating in the first grade in the US school system. Different studies have reported between 13% and 95% of all students admitting cheating at least once over the course of their academic carrier (Hains et al, 1986, Tittle and Rowe, 1973).³

As the institutions adapt to a growing number of cheats, students get more innovative and figure out new ways to cheat. Although no official numbers are available about the actual number of students caught cheating every year, studies indicate that this number is probably somewhere between 2% - 12% ( Shon, 2006).

Cheating can also be seen as part of a student’s strategy in order to improve his or hers grades.

In 2001 Whitley and Keith-Spiegel discovered that 87% of males and 54% of women believed that cheating could help them in an exam. Even though their study indicated that cheating did not contribute much to better grades, it explained in part why students cheat; they think it helps.

2.2.5 Cheating as a crime

The criminal aspect of academic cheating has been stressed in the past. Magnus et al. (2002) drew comparisons between cheating and corruption in a cross national study where they suggest a Tolerance-to-Cheating Index, similar to the Corruption Perception Index published annually by Transparency International (TI)⁴. Also, Bunn et al. (1986) pointed out the similarities of academic cheating and the act of theft.

But if cheating can be viewed as a type of criminal behavior, what drives the criminal? Becker (1968) proposed that a criminal can be seen as a reasonable man. Every act carries with it a certain amount of costs and benefits that the individual weighs accordingly. The costs for the actor can include things like the perceived punishment, the risk of social exclusion or the probability of getting caught. All things being equal, increasing costs would decrease the

for the actor in quantitative terms. This could include benefits like money, or in the case of cheating students, higher grades.

2.2.6 Cheating and goal orientation

Research has shown that students are mainly driven by one of two basic types of goals;

Mastery goals or performance goals (Anderman and Midgley, 2004). A mastery goal orientation means that a student is motivated to learn for the sake of education, where as a performance goal orientation implies that the education is only a means to an end (the end being good grades for example). Most evidence suggests that students highly motivated towards performance goals are more inclined to cheat (Newstead et al., 1996, Whitley, 1996).

It has also been suggested that up to 85% of all college students in the US only consider their education as a means to an end and that they are only willing to spend a minimum amount of time to achieving their goal (McCabe, 1996).

2.2.7 Cheating after college

The consequences of cheating are indirect; sublet yet serious. With more attention being paid every year to cheating in business, industry and government, the impact of this development can be observed in the growing numbers of reported cases of embezzlement, misappropriation of funds and insider trading (Michaels and Mirth, 1989). Correlations between cheating in collage and unethical business proceedings have also been confirmed by Davy et al. (2009).